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Subjects Between Legacies: How Fathers Construct the Relation Between Their Childhood Past, the Present of Parenting, and Their Child(ren)’s Future

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  • Sharani Osborn

Abstract

This article brings to the discussion of change in the meaning and practice of fatherhood a consideration of fathers’ position between generations and between legacies. Conceptualisations of temporality in the work of Schütz and Mead are applied in analysing a father’s dual position, as both parent and child, as a particular instance of the subject’s position in a present from which the relation between pasts and futures is (re-)constituted. Drawing on qualitative research with a diverse sample of 31 fathers, I argue that the responsibility to lay down a positive emotional and psychological legacy for their child draws fathers into an engagement with their own experience of being parented. The resources for interpretation, and even transformation, of a father’s parenting heritage are situated in terms of contemporary discourses of fatherhood and family and of persistent inequalities in the conditions under which fatherhood is forged.

Suggested Citation

  • Sharani Osborn, 2020. "Subjects Between Legacies: How Fathers Construct the Relation Between Their Childhood Past, the Present of Parenting, and Their Child(ren)’s Future," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 25(3), pages 333-349, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:socres:v:25:y:2020:i:3:p:333-349
    DOI: 10.1177/1360780419891176
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    1. Julie Brownlie, 2006. "‘The Basic Stuff of Our Memories’: Embodying and Embedding Discipline," Sociological Research Online, , vol. 11(4), pages 53-68, December.
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